


a sweetness old and new and rare

by Anonymous



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-29
Updated: 2018-09-29
Packaged: 2019-07-20 09:42:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16134659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: All Findaráto wants is to escape Nargothrond for a day with Balan, away from the politics and the pettiness and everything else.And when they finally make their escape, it is all so, so worth the hassle.





	a sweetness old and new and rare

**Author's Note:**

  * For [erlkoenig](https://archiveofourown.org/users/erlkoenig/gifts).



> for erlkoenig, who prompted "Something sweet; it doesn't have to be tooth-rotting fluffy, but some sweetness, some gentleness, maybe even a happy ending is appreciated."

It is a rare day when Findaráto can escape the city for long. And it is a rarer day yet when he can persuade Edrahil that no, he does not need to be surrounded by guards _thank you very much_ in a tone that implies no thanks whatsoever – or else he can rise early enough that Edrahil is still occupied elsewhere, and they can avoid this tedious and unneeded argument altogether.

And so, when a rare day such as this dawns, Findaráto intends to make the best use of it that he can.

He steals into his own kitchens before any but the earliest-rising staff are awake, and cajoles them to silence as he packs a meal with his own two hands: day-old bread if he is early or warm bread if he is running late, hard cheese and dried fruits, smoked meats and sweet wine. And today he finds a woven basket to carry it all and nicks a table covering to spread across the grass and sit, only to have both tugged gently from his hands and the kitchen staff re-pack the basket for him because _you know you will squash the bread if you place it beneath the wine, my lord!_

Of course he knows that, and he tries to explain as much, but he only receives indulgent nods and fond looks for his troubles, his explanation that _yes I know that but I am in a bit of a hurry today, it will keep won’t it?_

But then when he is finally ushered gently from the kitchens with whispered wishes for a beautiful day and good luck avoiding his own guards, Findaráto takes his spoils and steals back to his own room and his own bed. He returns with every intention of waking the other member of the day’s expedition and getting them upon their way – only to lose precious moments watching that beloved other member sleep.

Balan has been in Nargothrond for some years now, and sleeping in Findaráto’s bed for near as long. Seeing him like this, though – sleeping soundly, snoring softly, his tight curls mussed across their pillows – Findaráto always feels as though such years have not been long enough.

Any number of years that he has left with this man will not be long enough.

But no, that really is not a thought that he wants to be having today, so instead Findaráto takes a seat at the edge of his own bed, and stoops low to wake his bedmate and fellow expeditioner as softly as he knows how.

“Mmmmmmngghhh?” Balan comes awake with as much candor and as little pretense as he does anything else.

“Good morning, love,” Findaráto greets him quietly. But only half Balan’s face – his forehead, his nose, one side of his mouth, one cheek – has been adequately kissed at this point, so Findaráto cannot let himself be distracted by such endearing incoherence for long. Until Balan actually rises, at least. “Get up, get up, we have a guardsman to outrun!”

Balan groans, soft and low and sleepy, but eventually he turns to catch Findaráto’s mouth as it descends toward the as-yet unkissed cheek, and oh but all the stale breath and dry tongue in the world could not keep Findaráto from accepting and enjoying such a valuable gift.  

Balan blinks at him as they part. “Guard – outrun?” he asks, muzzily.

Oh. Yes.

“Yes,” Findaráto confirms, pulling back and standing with some reluctance. But he keeps his voice brisk, and pokes gently at the single shoulder that rises bare above the sheets. “I want to walk beyond the city with you today, just the two of us enjoying an early autumn day. Hurry, love – if we are not quick about it then we’ll be packed off with an entire entourage to make sure that oh, I hardly know, we don’t eat poisonous berries or something!”

Balan groans again – probably, this time, at the prospect of leaving warm sheets and everything that can be done within them – but he rises and prepares himself and follows Findaráto all the same.  

Just as he has always done, and Findaráto’s heart rises a little more at the realization.

And the walls of Nargothrond fall behind them soon enough, Findaráto laughing with glee at what must have been a narrow escape: the sun is already rising, and when they do not appear at breakfast Edrahil will come looking for them, only to find their chamber abandoned and empty.

“What are you so gleeful about this morning, mmm?” Balan wants to know. Now that they are out of sight of Nargothrond, he leaves off trailing Findaráto, stepping around to walk at his side and take the hand that is not clutching the ill-gained woven basket. “Do you take such joy at rousing a sleeping Man from a sound night’s rest?”

“Oh no,” Findaráto tells him cheerfully, leaning over to demand a kiss that Balan grants him, smiling too. “If my joy today had come from rousing a sleeping Man then we would be having a very different kind of morning, my love!”

“Incorrigible,” Balan groans, squeezing his hand lightly.

“Perhaps,” Findaráto admits happily, squeezing back, and this, _this_ , is what would have been missing if they had not been able to escape without his guards. When they are within Nargothrond and facing its many judging eyes, Balan remains fully conscious of his official status – Bëor, not quite a servant but not a full and equal ally either – and will not act beyond this title without much cajoling. But when they are alone –

Well. When they are alone, or at least out of sight of Findaráto’s guards and councilors and lords, then Balan acts the truth of what he is: a Man who is both very much in love, and very much able to stand up to Findaráto’s teasing for himself.

“What are you thinking of?” he asks now, gently, and Findaráto returns to himself with a start. But he does not say. They have been over all of this before, more times than Findaráto cares to count: both of them wishing that things could be otherwise while knowing all too well how they cannot.

So instead he shakes the woven basket. As a distraction. “Of what a beautiful day it will be, and how lucky I am with just my present company. And how much better a simple meal tastes when we do not have to eat it in front of the entire city, for some reason?”

Balan just shakes his head at this, fondly, and Findaráto wonders if he truly is so transparent. But before Balan can respond, something else seems to catch his attention: he stops in the middle of the path, listening hard, and then he actually drops Findaráto’s hand.

“One moment, love,” he promises, somewhat distracted by something Findaráto does not discern among the usual sounds of the woods. “Wait for me here, all right?”

And then he steps from the path and vanishes.

It is only this request for Findaráto to wait – and Findaráto’s own trust that his lover must know what he has asked and why – that keeps him from dropping the basket and dashing after Balan demanding answers, dammit!

But Balan returns soon enough, and as he does, Findaráto realizes that the answer he sought has been audible all along: he had simply discounted it. For Balan returns to him beaming, bearing a single golden honeycomb and trailed by curious, sleepy bees, and he draws level with Findaráto again to hold out a dark, calloused hand, a-gleam with gold twice over in the wavering early morning light.

“A tribute to you, my sweet-tongued rogue of a king,” Balan tells him, still beaming and a little sleepy himself as he offers this gift to Findaráto, and Findaráto –

– Findaráto can feel the tears start behind his eyes.

The details stack up, completing a picture that is almost more resplendent than he knows what to do with. Balan has little taste for the sweet himself, and yet he indulges Findaráto knowing that it is his favorite. Balan had risen from his rest and followed Findaráto here without a question of where they were going or what they might do when they had arrived, not even asking about the contents of the woven basket. And now here Balan stands, hand overflowing with a gift that is at once both greater and more precious than any other tribute that Findaráto has received in his role as a lord, a prince, a _king_.

The bees murmur around them both with inquisitive, drowsy voices, but they are not stung. And Balan’s smile never wavers at what must look like hesitation from Findaráto. Instead, his smile only grows softer, fonder, yet – another gift as honest and pure and sweet as the honeycomb he offers.

A single bee alights atop his wrist and trundles inquisitively up into his palm, across the comb.

This, and only this, is all that distracts Balan’s eyes from Findaráto’s face, and even then, only for a moment. He sets his other hand, back down, across the comb, utterly regardless of the stickiness that his fingers will come away marked with, and lets the bee crawl atop his hand before pulling it away again.

“Off you go, little one,” he murmurs encouragingly, lifting his hand and its inquisitive rider aloft so that the bee is among its airborne nestmates once more. “You have a whole kingdom and more of this goodness left – thank you for granting me a piece to give my own king, and for helping me ensure that it is worthy of him.”

Some inarticulate sound pulls itself from Findaráto’s throat at this, and he sets the woven basket down right there atop the path – gentle only out of deference to the wine, as its is the only sweet taste that he has seen Balan seek out. And then, as the bee on Balan’s hand takes flight and Balan turns back to him in concern at the sound, Findaráto takes his lover’s stubbled cheeks in both hands and leans forward for another kiss – deeper, fuller yet than any other they have exchanged this day.

He hears Balan gasp; he feels the one hand that is not full of honeycomb rise to press gentle against the small of his back.

“You have not even tasted it yet,” Balan gasps against his lips when Findaráto pulls away, just far enough to allow them both a breath.

“And I do not need to, for all that I know it will be sweet and good,” Findaráto murmurs, his eyes falling shut as his forehead comes to rest against his lover’s. “It is from you, after all.”

And he knows it must be so, for this gift comes from Balan, himself a gift in ways that Findaráto is still only just beginning to realize, even though he has known this Man for years upon years now.

“Sweet, silver tongue,” Balan accuses fondly, and Findaráto, his eyes still closed, feels the Man’s lips upon his own once more. He accepts them humbly, the promise of honey utterly unable to compete. 

But when they come apart again, Balan with eyes soft and full of joy and Findaráto’s own ever so slightly blurred, Findaráto shakes his head when Balan offers him the comb once more, eyebrows raised in inquiry. Instead, he cups Balan’s hand within his own, and raises the entire offering to his mouth. Bees murmur around their heads as Findaráto accepts his gift, and he can feel tiny, friendly feet picking their way through his hair, can see diminutive forms trundling through Balan’s curls and across his collar and down his arms.

One even lands atop Balan’s hand as it is raised before Findaráto’s mouth, and Findaráto fancies that perhaps it is the same explorer whom Balan had lifted aloft a moment before.

“I thank you and yours for your part in making such a kingly gift,” Findaráto tells it, quietly. “And for recognizing its giver as the only one who is worthy of bearing it.”

The bee gives no sign of acknowledging his thanks, and this time, takes off without encouragement from Balan.

And the Man himself, when Findaráto raises his head again, seems to have no complaints about the sweetness of honey when he is tasting it from Findaráto’s own lips.

                 

 


End file.
